Endless Night
by SilverDarkHorse
Summary: It is Christmas of the year 1977, and Sirius Black is teetering on the edge of madness. When one careless deed brings his world crashing down around him, with far-reaching consequences, Regulus Black has to step in and help his brother piece together the fragments of his life – if he can stop himself from being sucked into the terrifying vortex alongside Sirius.
1. Prologue

Endless Night

_Originally intended for The Saint or Sinner Challenge by Ravenclaw333 and the Christmas Challenge by Wolfgirl17 on HPFF._

_Also for:_

_**The Dark Things Competition**__ by __**mockingjaybird:**__ Night._

_**For Those with a Darker Mind Competition**__ by __**berryandlisa:**__ Dark!Sirius._

_Disclaimer: Title taken from William Blake's "Auguries of Innocence." Kindly note that this is a canon-divergent alternate universe story._

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><p>Prologue<p>

_10__th__ March, 1960._

"_Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the firmament, and those who turn many to righteousness like the stars forever and ever."_

_- Daniel 12:13_

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><p>It was the night of the tenth of March, nineteen hundred and sixty. It was the first night of spring, for spring had come early to the Yorkshire moors that year. And what a beautiful spring it was. The night was cloudless, the air sparkled like champagne; a brisk wind blew northeast, rustling the ferns and the night flowers, fleetly winging its way through the low-grown heather, and flinging sweet scents into the lairs and dens of the moor foxes, rabbits and hedgehogs. Thousands of stars were strewn across the skies, minute pinpricks of shimmering, luminous light, harbingers of hope and peace and righteousness, and all that is good and new and refreshing in this world.<p>

And it was on this night that the baby was born.

The little whitewashed cottage stood at the edge of the moor, a stone's throw from the tiny bridge that ran overhead the stream that separated the hamlet village from the wide, open expanse of the moor and dales. It was night, so a reverent hush lay upon the land, broken only by the sporadic hooting of the barn owls in the oaks scattered around. Yellow glimmers of lamplight shone out from the windows, and upstairs, the shadow of human figure fell upon the curtain, obliterating the glow within.

Hope Lupin lay on the bed, ruddy with exhaustion after having pushed a very unwilling baby out. She was now gazing down fondly at said baby, who was fast asleep, swaddled and rosy, beside her. The shadowed figure, who had been pacing up and down the hearth, now rose up next to her, and evolved into the person of Lyall Lupin. He sat beside his wife on the bed, and took her hand.

"Isn't he beautiful?" Hope beamed, and with a finger, gently caressed the sandy curls on her son's head.

"Yes, he is," Lyall agreed, also gazing down at his son with love. "And so are you, my dear," he added to her, and, leaning forward, kissed her softly. It was the truth. Hope had always been a very beautiful woman – beautiful in the best sense of the word; a liveliness of disposition and a sweetness of temperament mixed well with a finely tuned moral compass was borne out well by her face and smile. And tonight, flushed with love and excitement, she was radiant indeed.

"And what would you like to name him?" Lyall continued, taking hold of one small fist and smiling when tiny fingers curled fast around his own.

"John, after St. John, I think. The youngest and the brightest, and it will be fitting to name our little one after Him who was loved best." She smiled down at the sleeping child. "That makes a fine second name, and you shall choose the first. What shall it be?" And Hope looked up enquiringly.

"Well – I was thinking of…Remus, actually." He broached the subject hesitantly, aware that his wife was not fond of that particular tale. As anticipated, a cloud passed across her face, and Lyall could not but regret causing her even an instant of unhappiness.

"Look you, dear, are you being sure that's wise?" Hope asked, her native Welsh cadence seeping into her tones through concern.

"I – I think so, Hope. There's always been someone in my family in every generation named after that myth, and I'd like our son to bear that name."

The lines on his wife's brow did not fade. "I understand, Lyall," said she, "I really do, but why Remus? Surely – Romulus is a better name…the name of the victor?"

"I don't particularly care for Romulus, even though he _was_ the victor. He killed too, remember. It was a hollow victory. His hands were stained with blood; I wish my son to bear the mark of innocence."

Hope's brow cleared. "Well, I do suppose that reasoning is…somewhat credible – though I am doubtful, still." She gently stroked one chubby cheek, and broke into a smile when a tiny dimple appeared on the baby's chin. "However, it is your choice, and I will agree. So is that settled?"

Lyall smiled, and touched his son's head gently. "Remus John Lupin," he murmured. "My blessed little one." As though his words had been heard, the little boy awoke, and warm, curious chocolate brown eyes stared into Lyall's own.

He felt his face breaking into a smile, and looked up to find a matching one gracing his wife's face. "He awakens," Lyall whispered, reverently, almost. The baby's eyes followed him. "What do we want for you, Remus? What do we want for our son?"

"I know what I want for our son," Hope whispered back, loath to break the holy hush that had fallen in that magical instant when their baby opened his eyes. She picked him up, swaddling clothes and all, and padded softly to the window. Lyall followed, and curled an arm around her waist.

"Do you see the stars, Remus?" She asked, low, and the baby cooed, as though in agreement. "Do you see, little one, how brightly they shine, away up there? My wish for you, is that one day, you will become one of them, shine just as brightly."

Her voice dropped still lower, mingling, and almost lost amidst the late spring winds that blew in through the open windows, bespattering their faces with dew and the promise of the first rains of the season. "A star is a leader, a guide, and one day, you shall be such a one, and guide many to goodness and righteousness."

Lyall's embrace tightened, and he too, bent down to touch his lips to the child's head. "We ask not for wealth, nor worldly success," he said softly to his son. "We ask that you will be a beacon for good, for hope, and for happiness." He traced one star in the sky, the brightest and closest of them all. "Be loving in your heart, and forgiving in your ways. Do that, my son, and you will be the true victor."

Hope's fingers closed over his own, reassuring and uplifting in their very warmth. "All we ask of you, Remus John Lupin," she said softly, eyes still fixed on the stars, "is that you will be a good man, please God."

Somewhere far away, an owl hooted. The wind picked up as it swooped in down from the fells around the moors, and the flames in the lamps flickered, but did not extinguish; they continued to glow brightly, framing the still silhouettes of the small family that stood at the window of the little cottage, and looked up in prayer to the mighty heavens.

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><p><em>To be continued…<em>


	2. Endless Night

Chapter 1 – Endless Night

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><p><em>December, 1977.<em>

_Some are born to sweet delight_,

_Some are born to endless night._

_- William Blake, Auguries of Innocence._

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><p>It is nearing Christmas of the year nineteen hundred and seventy seven, and Sirius Black is teetering on the edge of madness.<p>

Or so he categorically denies, both to himself and to his friends, when they do make a point of it, except in such rare moments of soul-searching wherein eighteen year old boys occasionally indulge; in the dark of night behind conveniently heavy cubicle curtains, or on solitary walks along the edge of the lake, but only when he is alone, and never in the company of his friends. He is not quite certain what this madness is; it surely cannot be the chilling thrill that births in the pit of his stomach and makes his way outward, setting alight every nerve from fingertips to toes whenever he is aware that danger lurks nearby, or worse yet, the half-shameful prickle of elation along the edge of his spine when a careless word or deed brings an expression of hurt to a friendly face.

It is not, he thinks, a lack of conscience, per se, but rather, the dormancy of said conscience – it is notoriously hard to awaken. There are only two people who have successfully roused it so far – the first is his brother Regulus (and what a smug prat he had been about it, too), and the other, one mild-eyed and pink-cheeked Remus Lupin. Even James Potter, whom Sirius would go so far as to identify as his other half – the worse half, if you please – had not had much success in that endeavour.

These thoughts are hovering on the edge of his subconscious as he sits beside the fireplace with his three friends on this chilly winter evening, watching the flames spitting and sparking, and wishing that the git Snape was to hand, with the fire so close so as to be able to chuck him into it. And he is not paying any attention whatsoever to Remus, who is holding forth about something-or-the-other.

Until a stray word catches his ear and makes him look up.

-"start this Christmas if possible"-

Sirius pulls his scarf closer and leans forward, reluctantly casting aside all thoughts of pyromurdering Snape. "Start what, Moony?"

"Start the home, of course."

Sirius looks nonplussed. He hastily racks his brains to dig up any scrap of long forgotten information on whatever this new idea maybe, but it is a vain effort. His brain provides him with its customary blank slate. So he attempts to sound somewhat less than completely clueless. "What home are you talking about?"

Remus begins to sigh, the soft sound barely audible above the sibilant hiss of the fire, but turns it into a half-laugh instead, when his friend turns on him what is popularly known as the best _puppy-eyes_ at Hogwarts. "I should have known," Remus says, "I've been talking about this for two weeks at least, but you haven't been listening to a word, have you?"

"Er" –

"He was probably too busy thinking of new ways to murder Snape," Peter interjects, popping a meaty chestnut into his mouth, and hitting the nail on the head with his customary uncanny accuracy.

Sirius' cheeks turn pink. "I just got carried away for a few minutes. Please, Moony, tell me what it is?"

"Why should he?" James asks, and pokes Sirius in the stomach with his elbow. "You've been too busy doing what – daydreaming? – to even lend a sympathetic ear to your best friend, haven't you?"

The attempted guilt trip does not work; Sirius has, through many years spent among the denizens, living and non-living, of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black, been made impervious to all such tactics. The elbow to his flesh does work; James is thin, all sharp limbs and angles. Sirius doubles up, grunting in pain and rubbing the area vigorously.

His friends appear unaffected by his injury. Peter even guffaws.

Sirius thinks penalties for cobbing should not be confined to the Quidditch pitch only.

He rolls his eyes. "You had your fun. My curiosity is now sufficiently aroused. Please, do divulge your information."

Remus raises an eyebrow. He is not one for beating about the bush. "A home for werewolves."

"_WHAT?"_

And Sirius tumbles off his chair onto the hearth rug just below.

He stays there, open-mouthed and spluttering, looking for all the world like a fish out of water. The fire spits unexpectedly, and sparks jump out, landing near his arm on the rug. It brightens for a second, then turns to black, singeing a hole in the rich material, allowing the wooden planks below to surface. And then he jumps in his turn as the next shower of sparks land on his head. For a moment, he panics as the smell of burnt hair invades his nostrils, but then manages to still his quickening heartbeat when he notices that only the ends of his fringe are singed.

His friends sit back in their chairs and eye him in mild amusement, and make no move to help him up. And, in spite of the discomfort of one foot twisted unpleasantly underneath him and the other lying dangerously close to the fire, Sirius is glad to be spared the embarrassment of being bodily lifted up.

It is all of twenty seven seconds before he manages to extricate himself from the tangle of hearth rug, armchair and roasted chestnut shells on the floor, and take his place next to James once more. "What's brought this on, Moony?" He demands, once he has recovered sufficient equanimity.

"Considering that I _am_ a werewolf myself, don't you think it's natural for me to think of taking up a project like that?"

It is a fair point, but Sirius does not pause to consider it. He waves away the question impatiently. "No, no, what I meant was, why have you decided to do something about it so suddenly? There isn't a sharp increase in the number of unregistered child werewolves running around who need your help, is there? There hasn't been anything in the papers about it." His brow furrows as he watches his friend's eyes darken slightly. "Or have I missed something?"

Remus hesitates.

_Open mouth. Insert foot._

In that moment of silence, the wind picks up outside, and rattles against the window pane. Moisture trickles down the glass and hardens, forming minute icicles that glisten in the dying sunlight. The pause is pregnant, expectant. Sirius counts the icicles still forming, gazing at them through half closed eyes, and lets the quietness linger.

James shifts uneasily. Peter leans forward to stoke the fire. It does not crackle.

Remus cracks first.

"Ah, there has been something," he says, softly. The chocolate eyes are pained. "The werewolf who bit me when I was a child – he's started to come after my family again."

For an instant, Sirius is robbed of breath.

"How – what – when – did he bite someone? Your mother? Your father – are they all right?" Sirius' mind is whirling with questions, and his voice cannot keep up.

James lays a soothing hand on his arm. "Calm down, Pads," he murmurs. "If – if that had happened, Remus wouldn't be sitting here with us like this, would he?"

"My parents are all right," Remus assures him. "Dad has put up the strongest wards he can manage around our house. So Mum is perfectly safe. And Dad can look after himself. He's constantly alert – it's an ingrained habit. I'm afraid it's my cousins who aren't all right."

"Cousins?" Peter is the first to pick up on the plural form of the word. His own question is laced with undertones of unease, borne of an awareness of the sensitivity of the subject. "How many of them?"

"Two, as of now." Remus smiles grimly, the firelight sharply illuminating the darkened hollows of his cheeks. Cheeks, Sirius realises, that are a great deal thinner than they were two weeks ago. "He'll be after the rest of them soon, I've no doubt. Whether he'll manage to actually nab them, is another matter. Anyway, he bit my mother's sister's sons. They're Muggles – so they were absolutely defenceless."

_Surely not. _Even Muggles, without the supreme and effective defence of magic – Stunning spells, Blasting curses and the like – are not wholly without means to defend themselves. They have guns and bombs, weapons of human war, but equally effective as any magical means in the fight against werewolves. And oftentimes they are quicker than purely magical methods, and thus are adapted by many wizards for the execution of convicted werewolves.

Werewolves habitually gather in lonely spots, whether by pack – as many chose to live – or alone, for transformation, as those who chose to live among wizards did – they choose the wildest areas known to man on the British Isles; the lonely shires moors, far from civilisation, populated only by isolated hamlets, or the cold, bleak, mountainous terrain in the north of the country, in its caves and crevices, or yet further uninhabitable, the rocky, treacherous coastlines so beloved by smugglers and pirates of centuries past. There are, scattered even in these remote places, small pockets of Muggles – villages and communities accustomed to such hardships as the geography offered – and those who revel in them.

And from these communities spring the old wives' tales, the tales of solitary wolves who hunt children at the dawn of the full moon, the hulking Grims, great black dogs who speed across the countryside, spreading death and destruction in their wake, banshees, whose death-wail is sung each twilight to summon new-born infants. These are the tales spread among the Muggles, labelled as superstitions by the townsfolk, never dreaming that they had basis in truth, that they were more than supposed-mythology.

It is little wonder then, that these stories are encouraged by the magical communities themselves – it affords a double protection; Muggles on the outskirts of civilisation are reluctant to leave their homes at night, and thus reduce the risk for magical beings, of being seen, or harassed.

"That's not always the case, Pads," says a gentle voice to his left, and turning, Sirius discovers that he has spoken his thoughts aloud.

"What do you mean?" He asks.

"What you said is true – the rumours were encouraged to keep both wizards and Muggles safe, but that protection has waned in recent years."

Remus picks up the explanation from James. "With time, Muggles have become less trusting, less fearful of superstitions, and when cities and towns encroached onto the territories of the wizarding community, little by little, they in turn withdrew even further. There aren't many who are even aware of the tales these days, and so – when innocent people happen across werewolves on a full moon night…well…"

Sirius sucks in a breath. He forgets, often, that the well-stocked library at Grimmauld Place, rich in the history and tales of wizardkind though it is – and rich in darker, more sinister knowledge as well – hardly keeps up with the rapidly changing world outside. "Is – is that what happened to your cousins?" He asks.

"Yes," Remus says, and the shadow across his eyes deepens slowly. "Though in this case, I do know the werewolf positioned himself close to my cousins, ready to strike…he'd been shadowing them for a while, but they didn't know."

Peter leans forward, takes the newly roasted chestnuts off the fork they are stuck on, and presses them, still warm and smoking slightly, into Remus' palm, a gesture of friendship, of quiet reassurance. Remus smiles in return, a wordless acknowledgement.

"School had just let out for Christmas, and they'd been out to dinner. They live about fifty miles away from us – just beyond the moor, but it's still rather…wild…around the place. They were walking back; it was still a lovely night in spite of the frost, you see, with full moon shining so brightly…and that's when – when it happened." Remus' voice is quiet, composed as it always is, and there is no give at all, except the shadow of a quiver at the ends of his lips. "The older boy – Jack, he's twelve – was badly scratched, but he'll be all right. But the small one – Davy, he's only seven – he…well, they _think_ he'll be a full werewolf…_if_ he recovers, at all."

Hot, empty nut shells slip between pink fingers, rattling off the floorboards as they fall. The frost has let up, the windows are now a hodgepodge of damp patterns. Peter's short breaths are loud, harsh and out of place in their quiet little circle. To Sirius' left, James shifts uneasily. It is he who raises the next question: "Is he at St. Mungo's?"

"No. They refused him admittance because he's a Muggle. We didn't tell them that he was bitten by a werewolf. Dad sent my Healer to them…he says they have to wait until the next full moon to know, for certain. But Davy is very ill; all we can do is hope that he will recover."

"If it's as bad as that, don't you think it is better if – if he doesn't recover at all?"

The moment the words have left his lips, Sirius knows that he has made a terrible mistake. Peter's breathing suddenly stops; the ensuing stillness is sharp. James elbows him again. This time, he cannot feel the pain. Remus' eyes turn towards him, bright, bright, chocolate eyes, hardened now with an edge of steel that casts shivers down his spine.

Sirius takes his cue from James and opens his mouth to apologise, but Remus speaks first. "Do you know," he says softly, I used to think that way myself, until quite recently?" The brown gaze is fixed on Sirius now, and he stares into its iron depths, unable to look away.

"I thought death was preferable to this curse – that is was an infinitely sweeter prospect that living with myself – this _monster_ that I had become. It was like living through an endless night, never seeing the dawn." A heave of the sweater-clad chest. "I was obsessed, for a while, I wanted a way out. I did come very close…very, very close." Bitterness tints the edge of that gentle smile. "If my parents hadn't found me in time… my mother was ill for weeks afterwards. That was the first time I'd really seen Dad not knowing what to do." Another sharp intake of breath, and a slight softening of the hardened gaze. "I thought I was useless, redundant: a freak of nature. In the process, I forgot that I was, to two people at least, the most precious thing in the world."

And, looking at the shimmer in those clear eyes, Sirius wonders whether _he_ is anybody's precious thing.

"So you see," Remus continues simply, "My aunt and uncle want Jack and Davy to live, too. They aren't equipped to look after a werewolf, and if the Ministry should hear of it, they'll certainly be put down. So I thought – and my parents agree – that we should take them in, for a few months at least, until they adapt to their new life…and the transformation."

"And thus the werewolf home is born. I see," Sirius murmurs. "It's a good idea, Moony. I take that these are all under-the-table, cloak-and-dagger arrangements?"

Remus chuckles. "Of course. I can just imagine what the Ministry would say if they knew about it."

James laughs now, and vanishes the scattered nut shells with an elegant sweep of his wand. "I'd love to see their faces if ever they knew." He grins. "Say Dolores Umbridge, for instance. Or that git Macnair."

Peter murmurs his assent through another mouthful of chestnuts. Sirius rather thinks he would like to see his father's face – or his cousin Bella's, that would be perhaps even more amusing – if these plans were revealed to him.

And for one fleeting moment, he toys with the idea of doing just that.

"I'll help you with your plans, Moony," he says instead, summoning up a smile, and tries hard not to think how, with the utterance of a single phrase, he has the power to end the lives of more than a few innocent and goodly people.

Madness, he thinks, is surely an endless night.

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><p><em>To be continued...<em>


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